Homesick
by full-of-wrackspurts
Summary: Rory wants to go home


A/N Written to combat my own homesickness. I wrote it really quickly so I apologise for any mistakes.

Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who, it belongs to the BBC blah blah blah

"Rory, Are you OK?"

"Just thinking of home"

"Which one?"

"Leadworth," though he could also see his lives as a Roman passing through his head.

Rory looked out of the door of the TARDIS, for once not seeing the swirling time vortex but just the endless starlit sky. He missed home. It was so hard for him put up this façade for Amy. He knew the Doctor could see right through it. He saw that Rory just wanted to return to his normal, relatively peaceful life.

"You can go home anytime you want. I'm sure she wouldn't mind."

He couldn't deny that life with the Doctor was fun, exciting, exhilarating but he'd been with him too long. He was turning into him. He had experienced death so many times, with the Dream Lord, with the crack, with everything associated with the pirates, not to mention his life as a Roman. He saw so many civilisations come and go, should have died so many times that all he wanted was a little peace.

But how could he tell the Doctor that he wanted to go home because he was scared of becoming too much like him, the man who was capable of killing his own people to save the world.

This was the fundamental difference between him and the Doctor. They may have experienced the same things but Rory could never put the planet over the people he loved. Maybe that's where the alien side of the Doctor came from, the ability to separate practicality and emotion. In a choice between saving Amy and saving the planet, it would always be Amy, damn the consequences.

Breaking from these thoughts Rory came out with a question. ""Does she know that I phone my parents after every adventure?"

Although he tried to keep these calls a secret he knew the Doctor had noticed them taking place. He saw the flickers of jealousy. After all he had a home to return to, had people who would look out for him. He still had his family. His parents were still alive, even if they were starting to act their age. He wanted to be there to help them through their suffering. He didn't want to become the son who only ever contacted them once in a blue moon, to become the stereotype of the children who don't care for their parents.

"I'm not sure" admitted the Doctor

"I know why she's like this, she's used to not having her parents around at least in one childhood but I'm not. Even as the centurion I had someone who looked out for me."

His parents never liked Amy because she represented the girl who broke his heart so many times. She was also the cause of so many arguments: "why do you let her do this to you? You deserve better! You should get her out of your system!" It wasn't until Amy became a kissogram that he realised how true it was. Knowing that she kissed so many other guys as her job tore his heart apart. Even when he left Leadworth to get his nursing qualifications he felt the same way about her but his parents never begrudged him for it. He may be the boy who waited for Amy but he knew that Amy would never be the girl who waited for him. It was only his parents who had ever fully had his best interests in heart.

"You know they always ask me the same question."

The Doctor broke out of his own brooding when Rory returned to the conversation "What question?"

"When are you coming home? And the worst thing is that I don't have an answer. We go off on so many adventures that I don't know when we will arrive. I don't know if I'll even get back home."

"You mean you don't know if Amy will want to stop and if you leave her on the TARDIS, you're afraid she'll never come back," the Doctor said quietly.

In all of their adventures the thought of his family was always in the back of his mind but he was waiting for Amy to say "let's stop now, let's go home." He should have realised it would never be her who would say it; it would always be the Doctor. Despite the number of times he had put Amy's desires above Rory's the Doctor saw the man's craving to see his family, his craving for normality. He may never be able to fully understand the desire for normality but he recognised the feeling of homesickness, probably better than Rory did and gave Rory his wish.

"Rory, I'll take you both home. She'll never give up and I can't guarantee her safety for that long. She needs to be with her husband."

Rory never told Amy the full reason behind the Doctor's decision to leave them at their new house. Yes, it was because he was running from his death, but they could have had more time. For once the Doctor shared Rory's wish, for his family to be safe and hopefully happy. His guilt was sometimes overwhelming but when he looked at his life and his past he thought this is who and where I want to be for the rest of my life.


End file.
